


wish

by ahbonjour



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: i just really like waterfall
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-30
Updated: 2015-11-30
Packaged: 2018-05-04 05:24:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5322092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ahbonjour/pseuds/ahbonjour
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everyone in the Underground has made a wish on the "stars" of Waterfall at least once in their lives.</p>
            </blockquote>





	wish

“you make a wish on the stars,” Sans said to his baby bones brother, holding his hand as they looked up at the twinkling stones that covered the ceiling. “and then, sometimes, it comes true.”

Papyrus bounced up and down on his toes, he was so excited. “Really?!”

“yeah. gotta be a good wish, though. you have to impress the stars or it won’t come true.”

“Wow.” Papyrus’s eyes sparkled as he looked up at the ceiling. He leaned up, as close as his tiny feet could get him, and he made a wish.

* * *

Toriel and Asgore had gone to Waterfall together, on their one-year anniversary. They’d held hands as they walked its precipice, kissed under the umbrella, made secrets and promises as they wound their way towards their stars. They whispered love to echo flowers.

They dangled their bare feet in the water when they found the perfect spot, and Toriel rested her head on Asgore’s shoulder. “What do you wish for, King Fluffybuns?”

Asgore laughed and kissed the top of her head. “I wish for your happiness, and I wish for the happiness of our kingdom. What about you, my dear?”

“Well.” Toriel laid a hand over her stomach. “I wish for a happy future for our child.”

Asgore’s eyes widened. “Tori? Are—are you…?”

Toriel nodded, mouth curling up at the edges as she began to cry, as her husband began to cry, their tears mixing with the condensation and becoming new.

* * *

Undyne had chased off all her classmates again that day, every single one, even Zizi and Otheo. It would have been a proud moment in her personal history if it hadn’t resulted in her getting called to the principal’s office, her parents getting called to pick her up, the uncomfortable silence on the walk home.

“It’s normal for this to happen, right?” her mom asked her dad when they thought she wasn’t listening.

“I don’t know anymore,” he’d sighed. “I thought it was. But it doesn’t show any sign of stopping. Should we call a specialist?”

Undyne had run off after that, not wanting to hear them talk about her anymore. She’d ran as fast as she could, hoping maybe her legs could outrun all their words, the words of her classmates, the words of her teachers. She just wanted them all to go away.

When she reached Waterfall, she stopped, trying to see their stars through the water clouding her eyes. “I wish to be strong,” she whispered as she collapsed against a boulder. “I wish to be strong, please. That’s all I want.”

* * *

“Blooky?”

Napstablook looked over at their cousin, who was daydreaming against a fencepost again. “yeah?”

“Do you ever think you were made for so much more than this?”

Napstablook looked back over at their snails. “…no?”

“Well, you should try it. It makes you feel so romantic.” He leaned back, and Napstablook got the distinct feeling that if he had an arm he would have thrown it dramatically over his metaphorical forehead. “Oh! To be denied my destiny by sheer rote fate of being incorporeal!”

“this isn’t a bad job.”

“Work with me, Blooky!” He spun towards the shimmering lights on the ceiling. “Oh, non-existent stars! Grant me my wish to be the most well-known and well-loved showman the underground has ever seen! Grant me this and I will earn my place among you, as my own star!”

“the snails are getting away.”

* * *

“C’mon, Chara!” Asriel cried, rushing ahead of his sibling. “We gotta go see the stars!”

“They’re not really stars, Asriel.”

“No, I know. But they sorta look like them! I think.” He stopped at the end of the rope bridge, a thoughtful finger on his chin. “Do they?”

“Sorta,” Chara replied, not picking up the pace of their leisurely walk as they joined him. “The real stars are farther away, and smaller. They’re like—remember when you poked a bunch of holes in that piece of paper with mom’s sewing needles, then held it up to the light? They’re like that.”

“Wow,” Asriel breathed. Chara had joined him now and he slowed his pace so they could walk together. “What are you gonna wish for?”

“Nothing,” Chara said, voice blank. “I don’t see the point. It doesn’t matter if you wish on stars, the wish never comes true in the end. You don’t get what you want from shiny rocks.”

Asriel’s ears had fallen during Chara’s words, but he shook himself, gamely replying, “Well, you have me. And that’s something.”

Chara smiled and took Asriel’s hand in theirs. “Yeah. That’s true.”

* * *

“Sans?”

“yeah, bro?”

“Those aren’t real stars, are they?”

“…no, pap. sorry.”

“Why would you tell me that they were?”

Sans wanted to say ‘because one day you will see the real stars and i want you to be ready.’ But instead, he said, “because i like seeing you all starry-eyed.”

“Sans! That was so bad!”

“you’re laughing!”

“Urgh! Leave me alone!”

* * *

Alphys shivered and sniffed in the cold water. Her hands were still shaking. She’d just gotten promoted.

“In light of recent events,” Asgore had said, his voice deep and gentle and invading all corners of the lab, _her_ lab now, “I am promoting you to the new head of royal sciences. I wish it could have come with a happier occasion.”

Alphys hadn’t remembered what she’d said, probably something dumb and unnecessary, if she knew herself. God, how could she have been promoted? She’d only just graduated from school with her sciences concentration, she’d only been working under Gaster for a month—and now she had his job?

Worse, parts of him were going away. She knew something like this might happen when she’d seen the printouts on his last experiment, her memories of Gaster might be taken, fast, and now she could feel him, his consciousness, her snapshots of him, slipping through her fingers like sand. But what if the memories of her tutelage under him went away, too? She couldn’t lose that much knowledge. He had been so smart. And now it all could be gone and they would be stuck with her.

She began to sob, deeply, and under the shimmering rocks she wished that everything would be okay when it never would be again.

* * *

Catty clasped her hands together over her heart. “I wish for Mettaton to marry me!”

Bratty shrieked and pushed her. “No you do not!”

“I do, I totally do!” She pirouetted through the garbage, grinning brightly. “I wish for him to marry me and we’ll have a big wedding and I’ll have a big dress and we’ll live happily ever after!”

“OMG, Catty, noooo!”

“Why not?!”

“Because _your_ wedding to Mettaton is totally gonna conflict with _my_ wedding to Mettaton!” Bratty touched her chest with one hand and extended the other grandly. “But if you ask very nicely, I’ll let you be the flower girl.”

“You big loser!” Catty squealed, splashing her best friend with garbage water.

* * *

Flowey never wished on stars. He didn’t see the point.

The human seemed to, though. They stopped and started the whole way, pausing to listen to echo flowers, check out the telescopes, stop and turn and stare at the ceiling, the shimmering lights above them. Flowey couldn’t understand. What could they need to stop for? Their wish was already coming true.

They hadn’t killed a single monster and Flowey was infuriated.

When they stopped to look at the stars again and make another stupid wish Flowey watched them, water falling on his face, contorted in hate.

* * *

Papyrus had the human on their shoulders. “Stars, Sans,” he breathed, the softest his voice had been in recent memory, as they stood on the outcropping of Mt. Ebott. “Real stars.”

‘W-I-S-H,’ Frisk fingerspelled in front of his face.

“Right!” Papyrus cried, voice back up to full volume. He closed his eyes and leaned forward, getting close like he always did. This time, though, with the actual stars shimmering over his head, he said his wish out loud. “I wish for Sans to be happy.”

“what?” Sans asked, pupils contracting when he looked up.

“It’s what I always wish for.” Papyrus grinned. “And it seems to be working so far!”

“pap, geez,” Sans mumbled, suddenly feeling very tired. “thanks. i guess it has been.”

“What do you wish for, Sans?”

“me?” Sans paused, collecting his thoughts. “i don’t know. i mostly took you out so _you_ could make a wish.”

“Sans! I can’t believe you’ve wasted all those wishes!” Papyrus yelled accusatorially. “You have to make a wish, there are real stars now!”

“oh. um. okay.”

Sans looked up at the shimmering carpet of stars above them, breathed in the air, the fresh, real air, leaned against his brother’s hand. He could hear his friends talking somewhere, about something else, maybe about rain. He would get to feel rain now.

Papyrus shifted to hold his shoulder more tightly and Sans closed his eyes and made a wish.


End file.
